by Toby Neal
“None taken. Your company has its own private army and it’s true that there are only two of us on your case,” Sophie said. “But we expect to be apprised as soon as you find him. He hasn’t done anything that we can charge him with yet.”
“Except steal our information and sabotage our customers.” Remarkian’s tone was silky and deadly at the same time. “But of course. We’ll let you know the minute we find him.”
A silence. She could hear Remarkian breathing, which was amazing considering he was halfway around the world in Hong Kong.
“Anything else?” she asked. “Anything at all?”
“Yes. Lee isn’t all he appears. Dig into his financials.” Abruptly, Remarkian hung up.
Sophie immediately revisited Lee’s identity file. She’d been able to crack into his employee file at Security Solutions through her backdoor into the company’s server, and saw there was a direct deposit for his paychecks.
It was a simple matter to follow that to locate his account at Bank of Hawaii. A few phone calls later, the email alert on one of her rigs beeped with the receipt of faxed copies of his bank statements.
Sophie set one of her smaller analysis programs to weed through the reams of information to find any payments or extraordinary data, and quickly identified a pattern of nine thousand, nine hundred ninety-nine dollar payments twice a month in cash, payments that wouldn’t trip the federal reporting laws designed to track drug traffickers.
She printed up the anomalies and further wire transfers out of his bank to another account in the Cayman Islands. Lee had been stockpiling. Perhaps for this move. His current balance was zero. Her phone rang in her headphones, jarring her out of hypnotic analysis mode.
“Special Agent Sophie Ang.”
“Sophie? This is Alika Wolcott’s mother, Lehua. The doctor has allowed Alika to have visitors. We’ve just been in sitting with him and I thought you might want to stop by.”
Sophie’s heart began pounding. “Is he okay? Any change?”
“No.” Her voice came out on a sigh of released sorrow. “But no change for the worse, either. Come down and we’ll update you more fully.”
Sophie glanced at the clock on the wall. It was well past the dinner hour and she’d done enough today. “See you soon.”
On the drive to the hospital, she ticked over Alika’s situation. It was frustrating not to be able to do anything for his investigation. She mulled over the similarities between what Alika was being investigated for and what she suspected her ex, Assan Ang, of actually doing.
She’d heard about the investigation against Alika that her friend Lei had initiated on Kaua`i, the murder of a young woman involved with the drug trade. He’d been completely exonerated, but the fact remained that he’d been associated with those accusations and it had left a stain, made him vulnerable.
Sophie didn’t believe Alika was a drug smuggler because it went against everything he believed in as an athlete and a mentor to so many. But Assan was a different story. The only thing he loved more than power was money. For him, they went hand in hand.
Assan had an operation that shipped into Honolulu. Perhaps he had ties to the Boyz. She had to remember to ask Kamuela to look into it.
A uniformed police officer was seated outside Alika’s room when Sophie arrived just as Lehua was coming out. The older woman’s rich brown skin looked gray with fatigue and stress, and her sleek black bun was unraveling. Still, she forced a smile and took Sophie’s cold hands.
“He’s stable,” she said. “Try not to be too shocked when you see him. The doctors say the coma is the best thing for him right now because of the swelling in his brain.”
Sophie bit her lip. “I’m so sorry, Mrs. Wolcott. I’m just sick about this.”
“My boy is strong. He wants to live. My mother, Esther, has been communicating with him in the gray place between and she says he has every intention of coming back. It’s not his time yet, and we’re all supporting him with prayer.” Lehua’s large brown eyes shone with conviction.
Sophie couldn’t find a response to a statement so far outside of her world’s operational framework. Her mother had been a Buddhist, and she and her father were agnostic. She knew Alika practiced hula with his grandmother’s halau for special occasions, but she wasn’t familiar enough with Hawaiian tradition and spiritual practice to do anything but nod in agreement.
“I hope the prayer helps,” she said carefully.
Lehua squeezed her hands one more time. “They’re only allowing two people in the room at a time, and I’m meeting the family in the cafeteria for dinner. So you have him all to yourself for a little while. They say to talk to him. He may be able to hear you.”
Lehua let go of Sophie’s hands, patted her arm, and walked away. Sophie smelled a hint of gardenia perfume in Lehua’s wake. Sophie squared her shoulders and pushed down the door handle, stepping inside.
She’d tried to prepare herself. She’d told herself it would be bad, and she’d seen what people looked like after a fight many times. But there was no way to brace herself emotionally for what lay on the bed.
Alika’s was a body she’d studied from every angle as a coach and an opponent, someone she’d known so well she could predict his moves in the ring. Someone she’d dreamed about, whose heavily muscled, lithe body she’d craved to know in a different way, and whose kindness, intelligence, and business savvy she’d admired.
Someone whose friendship and passion she’d only begun to explore.
He was propped at an angle, his head swathed in bandages. An oxygen mask covered his nose and mouth, but every bit of skin on his face was discolored, swollen, and unrecognizable. His arms lay stiffly on top of the covers, one of them in a cast, his hands bandaged. One whole leg was encased in plaster and hung from an overhead pulley. Sophie could barely see any skin that wasn’t empurpled with bruising.
He was breathing on his own, she noted. That was something.
Her legs collapsed and she dropped into a hard plastic chair beside the bed. The room was filled with a chorus of tiny beeps and blips, and she could see his various functions tracking on a monitor.
Talk to him.
“Hi Alika. It’s me, Sophie.” Her voice sounded thready and her lips felt numb. She tried to imagine where he was, somewhere in the “gray between” as Lehua had said, and what might help him come back.
A storm of emotions engulfed her in a toxic welter that made her breathe hard, eyes prickling. Grief and rage at his brokenness. Compassion. And something like shame. She hadn’t been able to protect or help him, and she’d been angry with him while he was being attacked and fighting for his life.
None of that matters right now.
All that mattered was that he get better, and come back from this. The rest would sort itself out.
She leaned forward to touch the one uncovered spot of skin she could find, the bulge of his shoulder muscle. It was patterned with a curving tribal tattoo of interlocked triangles that followed to a dent where the cap of deltoid muscle met his biceps.
Sophie scooted as close as the IV stand, dangling dripping bags of liquid, would let her. She traced the tattoo gently with her fingertips, then leaned forward and placed her lips on it in a soft kiss.
“I’m so sorry this happened to you. I want you to know I’m here, and I’m going to help with your case as much as I can. I don’t know what we are to each other yet, but I care. A lot. More than is comfortable.” She stroked the small patch of golden brown skin with the black triangles on it. It felt hard and cold as marble, as if he were already dead. “I know you’re in there. And you can relax, and leave this to us. Marcella and Marcus are working it hard, and no matter what they uncover, we’re all fighting for you.”
She leaned forward and rested her forehead on his thigh under the white blanket, feeling her eyes sting with unshed tears, her hand still on his shoulder.
The door opened with a snick and she sat up abruptly, blinking.
Marcella had slipped
inside the room. She sucked in a breath and covered her mouth with a hand at the sight of Alika, big brown eyes wide.
“I know. There’s just no way to be prepared for how bad…” Sophie didn’t want to finish her sentence in case Alika could hear her, somewhere in the dim place where he was. “They say to talk to him.”
“Hi Alika.” Marcella came around to sit on the chair opposite Sophie. “You look like hell, man, like you’ve gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson and his six cousins, which I guess in a way you did. And they had bats and a pipe.” She nodded to Sophie. “We found one of the weapons used in his assault. The piece of pipe was thrown into the bushes beside his warehouse at the docks. We’ve gotten some DNA evidence off it. I’ve put a rush on the trace. He had some skin under his fingernails too. The lab thinks we might have something we can use to check for matches in ViCAP and AFIS by tomorrow.”
“That’s good news. Hear that, Alika? The attackers were careless.” Sophie stroked the tattooed dent on Alika’s shoulder, her eyes still on Marcella. “You might as well update us, Marcella. He should know what’s going on, too. We have no idea what he’s hearing or understanding, but you have to tell me anyway.”
“Okay. Well, initially it’s looking bad. Marcus and the forensic team found heroin trace all through Alika’s office and the warehouse. However, the crime techs think it has an odd pattern, more like someone took a packet of horse and sprinkled it around randomly than something that would have come about in the course of a package breaking open or something. In addition, as Marcus said he told you earlier, there were odd bills of lading in the files that have coded entries. And then, there was the cash.”
“What cash?” Sophie frowned.
“Ten thousand in his office safe.”
“That’s nothing. Pocket change for a business like his.”
“True. But we had to log it in. There was also opposing gang graffiti on the back of the building, as if the Triad had claimed it and then the Boyz came back and laid their signature across. It’s all circumstantial, but it’s systematic and multi-layered. Someone’s done a good enough number on him that we’re really going to have to dig for what was going on and who’s behind it.”
Sophie hissed a breath between her teeth, and turning to the still form on the bed, squeezed the bare spot on Alika’s arm.
“Bateman’s deep in his computers and we’ve done a search at his house. So far nothing there of note,” Marcella finished.
Sophie kept stroking Alika’s shoulder. She imagined the skin was warming under her touch and wasn’t quite so rigid and unresponsive. “Good.”
A soft knock came at the door and Sean Wolcott’s head turned around the jamb. “We’re back from dinner if you’re done visiting.”
“Sure.” Marcella stood. “I was just updating Sophie on progress on Alika’s case. Thought we’d let him hear it too. Let me bring you up to speed on what we’ve found out about his attack.”
She slipped out the door.
Sophie wanted to hug Alika goodbye, but that was impossible with all the cords and IVs and strapping on his chest. Instead, she rested her head on his chest and turned her ear against his heart. She could hear a slow, methodical thud, a metronome echoed on the monitor across from them.
“Just rest and heal.” Sophie stood and studied Alika carefully for any sign of change. There was none. He lay there like a broken mummy, just the way he’d been when she came in.
Chapter Fourteen
Sophie settled in front of her computers at home, her short hair damp from the shower. Ginger, still panting from the hard run they’d done upon Sophie’s return, flopped at her feet and heaved a sigh of exhausted happiness. Sophie dug a toe into the dog’s side, idly scratching as the home workstation booted up. The dog’s leg twitched and tail thumped.
Sophie had made a few decisions on that run, and as Ying came up to power, she put one of them into action. Accessing her coded cloud account, she downloaded DAVID once more back onto the computer’s hard drive.
She wasn’t going to be able to help Alika’s investigation without it, and she actually had a lot to do to catch up to where she would have been if Waxman hadn’t shut her down.
She consulted the checkbox task list she’d developed back at the office. Alika’s battered face was what filled her vision and demanded focus. She easily hacked into Marcella’s case on Alika in the FBI database and downloaded all the details to DAVID. She also re-activated her investigation into Assan Ang’s drug trafficking operation, the one she’d considered stalled. Maybe there was some commonality there too.
She set DAVID to mine for more information on Alika and Assan’s cases and then turned her attention to the worrisome situation with Lee Chan’s disappearance and whoever’s computer in the Arches building had tracked her.
Perhaps that was where Lee was hiding. Maybe he, or Security Solutions, kept some sort of presence there. It was worth checking out.
She accessed the Security Solutions database through her backdoor and scanned for any addresses or information regarding the Arches building.
It didn’t take long for an apartment number to come up: 9C.
That could be the location of the probe’s origin that had tracked her. Lee might be there. But wasn’t Security Solutions sending their own team looking for him? Who was the main user of the apartment? She scanned some more, but no renter’s name was listed on the lease but that of Security Solutions.
Lee wouldn’t hide on company property, would he?
Sophie glanced at the clock. It was 9:00 p.m., really too late to call Ken Yamada with something that wasn’t an emergency. It could wait until morning. She switched back to Ying as the DAVID prompt dinged with new inputs.
The DNA from two of Alika Wolcott’s attackers had been uploaded by the lab. It sat there, glaring at her from his case file.
Should she access ViCAP and AFIS from this workstation and run the DNA, in spite of being clearly directed not to, and it not being her case? Marcella and Marcus were probably home in bed, and it would take hours for the database to sort through all the DNA on file for any possible matches. Her friends would not thank her for pushing in on their case and violating her boss’s orders just because of her own impatience.
Tomorrow was going to have to be soon enough for that, too.
Sophie blew out a breath in annoyance. She was exhausted but too wired and upset to sleep. She dimmed the lights and slid out of her dragon-patterned robe. But instead of going to bed, she padded naked through her apartment to her home gym in the corner of the living room, and, in front of the wall of windows overlooking the jeweled city and moonlit ocean, she began a series of yoga poses.
Peace eventually came from the meditative, deep movements and controlled breathing, and eventually, Sophie sat in the lotus position, empty and calm, moonlight bathing her.
The Ghost realized he’d been holding his breath when it whooshed out in a whisper, loosening the burning sensation in his chest. He hadn’t noticed because he was so intently watching Sophie Ang, beautifully, perfectly naked, doing yoga in the moonlight.
He’d never seen anything like the sculptured perfection of her controlled movements. The light flitted over her skin in the grainy feed in a gorgeous striptease so that she appeared and disappeared in the black and white video.
He’d never meant to spy on her, stealing the dignity of a worthy opponent this way. That’s why, when he’d unlocked her apartment and fended off the ecstatic greetings of Ginger, he’d carefully pointed the camera in her bedroom at her computers so he could monitor what she was doing there.
He was no prurient peeping Tom. He was doing necessary surveillance.
He’d put another webcam in the kitchen where she might talk on the phone while doing chores, and a third in the living room, pointed toward the corner where her exercise equipment was stowed alongside a sleek desk with a phone on it. He’d placed the camera to catch her on business or phone calls.
He’d never dreamed she had s
uch a habit of walking around her apartment naked. The sight was pure visual poetry, and made him want to play violin while she moved to create a worthy background.
He’d wired for audio too, in case she let slip confidential information germane to his situation. Tonight he saw she’d reloaded that program she wasn’t supposed to have, and she was on some sort of mission. By zooming in on her computer, he’d been able to grab screenshots of what she was doing, and it bore close watching.
She was trying to find the origin of the computer trace that had found her location. He’d beaten her in this particular move of their virtual battle, but he couldn’t let her find him. He had to set up an alternative identity, move out of the corner she was trying to box him into.
He could hear the slow, deep sounds of her breathing as she sat perfectly still, her legs folded and hands on her knees. Her spine was a supple wand, her profile as pure and beautiful as the ancient Egyptian head of Nefertiti sculpture he’d liked enough to buy in bronze for his bookshelf.
The moonlight flowed in an unbroken mercury line from her throat down her small, round, pointed breasts, along her contoured stomach, and over the curved lines of her thighs and buttocks.
The Ghost’s whole body was rigid as if electrified. The fine hairs of his arms stood on end, and his heavy, painful erection seemed to throb with the beating of his heart.
Sophie Ang was perfection. Everything he’d ever wanted or dreamed of in a woman. She was his physical, intellectual, and emotional equal. Even her lonely habits echoed his.
She was his female counterpart.
He’d never had such a violent attraction before. He prided himself on independence, easy to maintain because women were tiresomely emotional and talkative. They were always trying to attach to him like remoras to a shark. He had no use for them and his sex life had been, until now, a series of one-night stands with willing partners who wanted more from him than he’d ever give.
She was different.